


Cardiac Attack In The Cradle Of The Summer

by pickapersonality



Category: All Time Low (Band)
Genre: Fluff, Jack's an asshole, M/M, They love each other really, alex likes reminding him
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-27
Updated: 2018-07-27
Packaged: 2019-06-17 03:50:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15452733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pickapersonality/pseuds/pickapersonality
Summary: The bus is crowded, more bands and photographers and groupies onboard than there should be. It seems like each nook is stuffed with yet another warm body, all chattering, drunk conversation and thighs around waists in the corners where Jack wishes he was. The lights are dimmed, plastic cups and bottles of booze strewn over every surface.They're a little old for this, he supposes. But this is Warped, and the last Warped, at that. It's only fair that they go out in the same style in which they entered.-Jack sorts out his life, a little.





	Cardiac Attack In The Cradle Of The Summer

**Author's Note:**

> I sent this to two friends because I was paranoid about typos, so if there still somehow happen to be any, please let me know so I can edit them. Thank you! :) 
> 
> Disclaimer: probably not in the slightest accurate to how Warped actually works. I've never been and now I'll never be able to go, so. I'm very sad, let's wrap up this author's note. 
> 
> Title taken from "Birthday" by All Time Low.

Jack feels like the summer heat is draining him. It's soaking into him, perspiration seeping in dots behind his ears and under his hair, all clinging on like a mist. He's being suffocated, slowly but surely, and it's crawling underneath his skin. 

Warped is one long stretch of excitable people and overheated exhaustion. He's crashing from the first, toeing the line of the latter, his sunglasses on his head and dark shirt uncomfortably damp. The ground is hard, baked, and it almost hurts to walk over. Everything is leeching the life out of his body. 

He's met countless people over the last few days, some he recognised, some he didn't. He's smiled, chatted, laughed, and it's sincere sometimes and so bitterly forced others. He thinks that if one more person stops him on his way to the bus, he's going to snap. 

He snaps. 

It's just a girl, about eighteen, with bushy brown hair and wide, happy eyes. Maybe it's her easy air that brushes against his tension, or maybe it's just him- but when she stops momentarily, fiddling with her lanyard, and she says softly, 

"Jack Barakat! Hi!" 

He just sighs, rolls his eyes, and mutters, "Oh, for god's sake." 

It's bad, he knows, and he distantly registers his gut twisting a little as her happy expression crumples, eyes clouding with a little bit of heart-break. He doesn't recognise her; maybe this is her first time meeting him. Maybe she's been a fan for a month, a year, ten- who knows. But she looks utterly gutted. 

The few groupies huddled around him, holding barely-touched bottles of water and wearing ridiculously huge sunglasses - he's never seen any of them go near any of the mosh pits - giggle stupidly, used to doing whatever they think he wants them to. Groupies are like puppies with a mission: they're mostly harmless, sweet, but determined to latch on until the end. It's like carrying around an army of robots, programmed to copy his every move. 

Right now, he really wants to tell them to get lost. 

"Um," the girl tries again, voice a lot quieter. "Hi?" 

His voice is monotone, flat. "Hi." 

She purses her mouth, smiles quickly, and blinking, strides away as fast as she can. His eyes follow her flannel-clad back as she disappears back into the crowd. 

Fuck. 

-

 

"What the fuck?" Alex kicks his leg, where his foot was propped up on the countertop of the bus as he lounged back on the couch. He's suddenly unbalanced, unsteady, as he falls to the side, nearly dropping his phone on his face. 

"What the fuck?" Jack returns, gesturing to his half-crumpled body. "What's wrong with you?" 

Alex's face is tight, angry, and he runs a hand through his bleached hair in an affected manner. His tank top shows off the subtle definition of his biceps; it distracts Jack for half a moment. 

"You were rude to a fan, jackass." 

Realisation comes crashing down like a wave, and Jack shoves his feet onto the coffee table instead. Guilt creeps in a little, like a mini hurricane of regret has started up in his stomach, but he quashes it briskly. "I was tired." 

Alex sets his jaw and glares at him. "So? We've done this a million times. Grow up, Jack." 

"You haven't even left the bus today!" Jack opens his palms in an are-you-dumb motion, meeting Alex's hazel eyes defiantly. "It's fucking exhausting." 

"I was on the phone for most of the day," Alex says, slowly and deliberately, "Helping to organise our next tour. The fans aren't chores, you asshole. Your dickhead attitude makes us all look bad." 

Jack goes back to his phone, flipping Alex off with his other hand. 

That last for precisely three seconds, before his phone is ripped from his grasp and thrown across the couch. 

"Fuck off-" 

Alex plants his hands either side of Jack's legs, caging him in and leaning in close. From here, Jack can see the beginning of his dark roots growing in, the flecks of green in his eyes. Alex's breath is warm as it hits his face, and a flushing heat climbs up the back of his neck. It's not unwelcome. 

"Our fans are not tedious," Alex spits, and Jack unconsciously leans back, head hitting the back of the couch. Alex follows, pushing him. "They're the reason we have a career." 

"I'm pretty sure we're the reason we have a career," Jack counters, eyes dipping to Alex's mouth, set in a hard line. 

"Don't be that asshole, Jack," Alex mutters, voice dropped but still bitterly jaded. "Nobody likes that asshole." 

Jack doesn't want to hear what Alex has to say, plus the crawling heat underneath his skin has heightened just enough to tell him that yes, he wants Alex, and he wants him now. So he reaches up and threads a hand through the back of Alex's hair, and yanks him down roughly. 

He's not gentle, either; he bites at Alex's mouth, catching his lower lip between his teeth and rolling it. His fingers tug at the blonde hair they're threaded through, pulling ungraciously. Alex is kissing back, angrily, like fire on fire, and makes a noise halfway between a shuddering sigh and a whine. His mouth is warm and languid and yet harsh on Jack's, matching him tongue-to-tongue. 

Alex wants this just as much as he does. Jack can feel him moving closer, and slides his unoccupied hand up Alex's chest, feeling the heat of the exposed skin above the neck of his tank top, and the line of goosebumps that follow the brush of his fingers. 

It must be the sudden presence of Jack's skin on his, but Alex jerks away suddenly, Jack's hand ripped from his hair. He shoves himself away from the couch, leaving Jack glaring up with bitten lips and a smug look. 

"No!" Alex snaps, fruitlessly trying to pat down the now-crazed mass of hair on his head. "You are not fucking me into forgiveness! I'm still mad at you." 

Jack watches, amusement building in his chest like a sneering ballon. Alex shakes his head, lost for words, and Jack takes vindictive pleasure in the fact that the singer's bottom lip is bleeding. 

"We stopped doing this," Alex sighs, and oh, disappointed Alex is less fun than mad Alex. Jack's balloon deflates rapidly. "You can't- you're not capable of being a good partner. Sex to you is just something you use to make me like you." 

"You don't like me anyway, Lex?" Jack smirks up at him, tracing his lower lip pointedly with his tongue. Alex's eyes follow the motion briefly, before he tears himself away, letting out an annoyed huff. 

"Fuck you. You're an asshole to the fans, and you're an asshole to me." Alex turns his back and walks away, towards the entrance to the bus. "I'm going to go walk around, and try to stop this day from being one All Time Low loses a sad fan." 

"Just one fan," Jack mutters, clawing for his phone across the sofa and refusing to acknowledge the guilt that's crept back into his gut. 

"You're just one guitarist," Alex says, pausing at the door. "They are so many bands with good guitarists who aren't dicks." He pushes it open, and sunlight rushes into the bus. "Don't be that asshole." 

The door slams behind him, and a text pops up. It's from Rian. 

_17:32  
i'm walking round, a fan just told me you brushed them off earlier, stop being an ass _

 

He throws his phone back across the sofa. 

-

Their set is great. Jack can't remember the last time people started crying two seconds into the opener - in a good way - and Alex sounds great, despite the split lip Jack keeps eyeing with a twisted sort of glee. He jumps, spins, goes out to the crowd. They scream, grabbing for him, clutching at whatever bit of his flesh they can reach. As he turns back to the stage, he give Alex a blasé smile, while the feelings of euphoria rush up around his ears. He's drowning in it. 

Alex rolls his eyes, so briefly that Jack's sure nobody else noticed, and pointedly looks away. 

-

The bus is crowded, more bands and photographers and groupies onboard than there should be. It seems like each nook is stuffed with yet another warm body, all chattering, drunk conversation and thighs around waists in the corners where Jack wishes he was. The lights are dimmed, plastic cups and bottles of booze strewn over every surface. 

They're a little old for this, he supposes. But this is Warped, and the last Warped, at that. It's only fair that they go out in the same style in which they entered. 

There's a few guys and girls milling around who are new to Jack, but he knows most of them; they're friends from years ago, crew members he's known as they've moved around his musical social circle, newer bands he met yesterday or the day before. The atmosphere is half chilled-out and half heat-crawling-under-skin and beer clutched in right hand, as he leans back against the couch and drinks every so often. 

The heat is itching and yearning, clawing at his mind, telling him, "We need something, we need someone." He's trying, really. He just doesn't want to sleep with anyone he doesn't know, doesn't want to be known, now, at the near-age of thirty, as the guy from that band who everyone's had sex with. Even if he's already that guy. Never to late to change, right? 

Jack sighs down into his drink. Across the bus, Zack is pouring beer from its glass bottle into a plastic cup, chatting easily with a girl with red hair and crooked front teeth. Rian's nowhere to be seen. A few faces are recognisable instantly: Jenna from Tonight Alive is here, drinking something orange and non-alcoholic; that guy from the cool pop punk band Jack's been hearing about for a while is in the corner, sporting his newly-dark head of hair - Pete? Paul? Patty. 

Jack wants to talk to precisely none of them. 

It hits him that Alex has entered the bus about ten seconds after he has. The singer is laughing instantly as someone fires a stupid comment at him, white teeth flashing in the dim glow of the bus. His hair, silvery now, is mussed, damp a little at the edges from the every-present layer of sweat that clings to all those on Warped. 

Jack wants to punch him. He wants to shove him up against the wall. He wants to kiss him like he's kicking him in the teeth. 

God, he's nearly thirty. He should be over the reckless surges of want, should be looking for someone he wants to spend the rest of his life with. Not obsessing over his best friend and kind-of-boyfriend of the last decade-and-a-half. 

Alex doesn't seem to notice these thoughts emulating from him. The singer shoves himself down onto the couch beside him, exhaling deeply. 

"You find the fan?" Jack asks, although he doesn't care. He wishes he did, and he knows he will, but right now, the buzz of want mixed with the buzz of alcohol is prohibiting him from feeling anything except the urge to reach over and grab at Alex. 

"Nah," He sighs, running a hand through his bleached hair. "But I did find someone who was friends with her. Apparently. Said she'd been sad all day. Sounded like what you'd said. Fuck." Jack blearily looks over to Alex as he punctuates that word with a groan. "You're such an asshole." 

"Thanks,' Jack snaps. Everything is so hot around him, rising up around his ribcage and spreading warmly through his chest, although it's too prickly to be comforting. "You're great at reminding me." 

"You suck." 

"You want me to?" 

Alex inhales his beer, coughing and choking with all the grace of a fish out of water. Jack lets his lips play around the words, twisting up and curling slightly, although he can't help but realise that the words sounded - and were - far too sincere for his liking. 

"Didn't we-" Alex splutters a little, trying to regain his dignity and failing epically, much to Jack's amusement- "Discuss this earlier? And my answer being no?" 

"Dude, I'm not trying to manipulate you, or whatever the fuck you think I'm doing," Jack rolls his eyes, slumped back on the couch and letting the fuzzy numbness travel across his body in a soft, spill-like fashion. "I just want to have sex with you. I'm a mature adult, stating my desires." 

"'Jack Barakat' and 'mature adult' should never be in the same sentence," Alex shifts onto his hip, turning so that he's facing the sprawling mass of limbs that is Jack's body, "However much stating you do." 

"You're the asshole here, I'm starting to think," the guitarist replies, and casts a look down to where the above lighting casts shadows beneath Alex's collarbones. "You're just selectively an asshole to me." 

"Aww, Jackie. Who's gonna be an asshole to you if I'm not?" 

Alex is cooing, leaning closer to Jack, and before he can pull back away, Jack twists quickly to face him and meets Alex's mouth with his. 

He leaves it half a second, for Alex to pull away if he really, genuinely doesn't want to do this. Half a second passes, and the singer is still there, frozen, but in a half-teasing, half-apprehensive way; he's almost nudging at Jack to continue. 

He's a man of his word. 

Jack slides a hand around the back of Alex's neck, feeling the damp hair at the nape and twisting his fingers through it, guitar-string-calloused fingers against the smooth skin. The kiss is warm and wet and heavy, carrying all the tension from their fight earlier, as if they'd both been waiting out on this to soften the anger of the other. 

Jack plays at the side of Alex's leg, prodding a little, almost completely done with subtlety. Alex catches on quickly, as he has done for the past ten years, and turns further, so as to swing the leg over Jack's lap gently to straddle him. Jack's hands slip from his neck, travelling down the length of his tank top to rest on his hips, over the denim waist of his jeans. 

Alex groans into his mouth, and Jack feels it in his teeth and bones, squeezing Alex's hips and pushing up the tank top with his thumbs to find purchase on his bare hips. Alex's own thumbs push up at the base of Jack's chin, smoothing over the dark stubble there. 

Alex breaks away momentarily, leaving Jack gazing at his mouth hazily. "We shouldn't be doing this here." 

"What?" Jack chuckles. "On a tour bus? On the tour bus couch? Or on the tour bus couch in front of people with big Twitter accounts?" 

Alex's eyes are molten gold. His hand travels from Jack's shoulder, down the guitarist's arms, and comes to rest on Jack's hand, settled on his own hip. "No, I meant-" He starts, then cuts himself off as if he'd never meant to speak at all. 

Jack watches as something little seems to break, as the singer looks down at him with expanding pupils. It's like a snap of a temporary measure, a half-built dam put in place to hold off a river that flooded, but prevented drought. Alex, for all his carefully pieced-together lines of lyrics and melded metaphors has never been any better at subtlety than Jack; perhaps even worse. 

So Jack's not surprised, really, when the apprehension in Alex's face drains, and his lips widen to a small, bursting kind of smile. "I don't think anyone's using the end room." 

"You think we can get out of here without anyone noticing?" Jack nuzzles into Alex's neck, leaving the barest traces of kisses over the skin there. 

"You tell me," Ales whispers back, grinning against Jack's ear, and begins to slide backwards, off his legs. 

They manage to slip out of the party-occupied area of the bus with minor sightings (Rian, who has materialised, holds up a beer in cheers to the sight of their hands entwined; Alex flips him off) and into the darkened room at the very end of the bus, usually only used for video games and Alex's random spells of lying around and strumming a guitar, piecing together a new melody. 

Once the too-good-to-be-true glow of the party has been rinsed from the air, Jack feels the singer's hand clutch onto his a little more tightly, as if to ground himself. Or maybe Jack. Maybe Alex has gotten so used to bringing Jack back down to ground level from the dizzying views of the clouds that it's simply a force of habit by now. 

Alex pushes Jack a little sharply up against the door as he closes it, cutting off the party completely and reducing their light to the waning lamp in the corner and that pooling through underneath the door. 

"Why were you so bitchy to the fan earlier?" Alex murmurs. Jack can't help it; he laughs, chuckling just a little. 

"And you were the one telling me I manipulate you." 

Even in the darkness, Jack can _feel_ Alex roll his eyes. "Shut up, I'm not doing that. I just want to know." 

Jack sighs, a long, drawn-out sigh. "I don't know. I was tired. I'm human. I'm sorry." 

And it hits then, in the darkness of the room with Alex's arms caging Jack to the door in an oddly sweet way, that he is. Maybe it's Alex. Alex has always been the one who brings out the best in him. 

"Yeah," Alex sighs too, but more in the way of releasing a long-held breath, as if he'd simply wanted to hear Jack say it, even if he'd known. "I feel like I can't ever be human, sometimes. It's like I'm just going round in a haze. Can't even remember people's names five minutes after I've met them." 

"You're too robot." 

Alex traces Jack's cheekbone with a light graze of his nail. "You're too human." 

"Arguably better to be." 

He laughs, short and bitterly sweet. "Probably." 

"'Lex," Jack watches Alex from underneath half-closed eyelids. "Be human with me. Maybe just now, or maybe longer. Whatever you want." 

"You sound like your favourite lyricist from ten years ago," Alex snorts. Jack finds it to be almost painfully endearing. 

"Hell no, I could never be a tenth as good as John Mayer." 

Alex pouts. "Rude." 

"Be human with me." 

Alex pauses, and tentatively leans forward. The darkness of the room feels like a blanket. "Okay." 

-

Hours later, when the party has ended and Jack can hear the line of quiet outside the room, he lies in between Alex's hips and above him, elbows braced on either side of his head. It's a golden place, intertwined with shimmering threads and gleaming cloth: the sweat beading on Alex's chest, his hair, his eyes. The leather of the couch is harsh against the pallor of Alex's body, his shoulders sharp against the black, while Jack's tanned limbs are another, warmer contrast above. 

It's the most beautiful picture Jack thinks he's ever seen, even compared to the countless more near-identical ones it follows. 

Alex's hands grasp at his shoulders, nails biting down into the skin and doubtlessly leaving dozens of little crescents. His legs are wrapped around Jack's waist, knees slid into the alcove of his hips; they're two puzzle pieces, fitting perfectly together. 

"Why did-" Alex whispers, breath hitching, lips moving against the golden plane of Jack's shoulder, "Why did we stop doing this?" 

Jack knows he's not just talking about fucking. It's been too long since there was this warmth, this glow of safety and softness that could only be shared between the two of them, ever. Right here, right now, Jack's not afraid to admit that he loves Alex Gaskarth, and that makes it a certain sort of moment alone. 

"Your idea," Jack murmurs, and Alex tips his weight suddenly so that Jack rolls right over. The world tips sideways for a moment, and he hits the ground with a low "Oof," Alex on top with a wicked look in his eyes. He's just thankful the couch is low-seated. 

"You know what else is my idea?" Alex leans down and continues his butterfly kisses just below Jack's ear. He turns his head and exhales as Alex extends the line, ever-so-slowly, downwards along the join between his jaw and neck, his Adam's apple. "You tweeting that fan. Better idea than the other one." 

"Fuck's sake," Jack reaches up and twines his fingers through the hair at the back of Alex's head. "This is starting to be more and more manipulative, Alex Gaskarth." 

"I love you." The words are abrupt, sudden, and so, so quiet; Alex's lips barely move away from Jack's neck, as if he's trying to muffle them. But they catch in Jack's mind like a hook, tugging away the loose, hazy golden strands. 

Alex must feel him stiffen, as he pulls away finally and hovers over Jack on his elbows. His eyes are huge in the dark. "That can't be a shock." 

Jack shakes his head, slowly. "No, I mean- I know." 

"Wow," Alex huffs out a laugh; Jack feels it breeze over his face. 

"You know I love you too, asshole,' Jack rolls his eyes, "We make each other the worst people in existence. But also the best, so. Worth it?" 

Jack thinks he could see Alex's smile universes away- it's not a Cheshire Cat grin, more starry and sunny and carrying quantities of adorable happiness of galactic proportions. It makes Jack want to do anything he can to be able to see it every goddamn day of his life. 

The day has spiralled, from the unfortunate fan (whom he will tweet, if only to shut Alex up, but also maybe because he feels a little terrible about the whole fiasco) to parties of drunk musicians to now, and now feels like one of those moments in life that Jack likes so much that he'll have to reach out and steal it to imprint into memory perfectly, each heartbeat louder than the last and carrying twice as much weight. 

Alex leans down and gives Jack the most fleeting, soft, sweet kiss he thinks he's ever received, and in between heartbeats, whispers, 

"Obviously."


End file.
